Kill me quick: Meet the Italian Mafia boss from Blackpool

At 22 she ran the family firm in Italy. Now a single mother on benefits, Marisa Merico tells Lucy Fisher of her life in the macho world of the mob

Marisa Merico, aged 14, poses with relatives — and a gun and a doll (Marisa Merico)

Like anyone separated from an elderly relative, Marisa Merico, a mother of two
from Blackpool, is keen to visit the Italian grandmother she has not seen
for almost two decades. It is not distance that has prevented the two from
meeting, however. The woman Merico refers to as “Nan” is Maria Serraino, 81,
head of a drug smuggling gang who is under house arrest in Milan.

Merico herself has been unable to set foot on Italian soil for fear of being
arrested for her own crimes. She took over the family branch of the
’Ndrangheta criminal syndicate when she was just 22.

This spring an Italian arrest warrant against Merico expires after 12 years
and she will finally be free to visit her grandmother — known to the
Milanese underworld as La Signora and to the Italian branch of the family as
“Nonna Eroina” (Granny Heroin) for her multimillion-pound smuggling
operation,